Anyway, sometime after that, I thought, “I should do that, but for quotes I like in books I’m reading.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So yeah, I started collecting quotes around May or June of this year. Some quotes are older, just sitting around on my Notes app. Some I would use as epigraphs\u2014none of those are below. I don’t think, anyway. Novels might be over-represented\u2014I think if I wrote down every single line of poetry that made my heart explode, I’d be stopping so much that I never finished a collection. Anyway. The idea is that I’ll do this every year, but maybe it turns into like a twice a year thing, depending on how long this thing goes. Speaking of length! Without further ado, here are better writers: <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe waiter whipped out a handkerchief and removed the feather. And that too was a horror: what have we lost when you can\u2019t shake off your own jacket or wash a single dish, when comfort is your only concern. What are we willing to ignore, or let atrophy, for the right to indolence. What a monstrous thing, comfort.\u201d – Yuri Herrera, \u2018Season Of The Swamp\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis is something to learn from: civilization without capitalism and how it can work.\u201d – Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Anarcho-Indigensim: Conversations On Land And Freedom<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cLewis\u2019 mother \/ Says we\u2019re snobs and we only think about poetry \/ It\u2019s true \/ There\u2019s something about America that\u2019s unthinkable\u201d – Bernadette Mayer, \u2018Midwinter Day\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMy least favorite part of the day is from 2:34 to 4:56 in the afternoon.\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018Dr. No\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019re gonna stay in Chicago, just so you know. Don\u2019t be scared.\u201d – Theodore C. Van Alst Jr., \u2018Pour One For The Devil\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAs soon as they left the river and entered the bayou, the landscape grew denser, twitchier, closer, as if the trees had bent over to give them a sniff.\u201d – Yuri Herrera, \u2018Season Of The Swamp\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe map had been the first form of misdirection, for what was a map but a way of emphasizing some things and making other things invisible?\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018Annihilation\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMarch 9 \/ Does numb have a sound?\u201d – Mayda Del Valle, \u201cChronology Of Sound\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI would like to sing the praises of frogs\u2026Ancient beings here of this place, maligned in European fables of frogs and princes; I love them.\u201d – Winona LaDuke, \u2018To Be A Water Protector\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201chow brash, the wind\u201d – Elise Paschen, \u201cHeritage\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis is the place where the Earth is born. The farthest and most remote set of islands in the world is a magical land.\u201d – Winona LaDuke, \u2018To Be A Water Protector\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAlways talking about books and painting and music and all. It was funny, the way he\u2019d go on about that stuff; probably thought he was the only one who cared about it.\u201d – Theodore C Van Alst, Jr., \u2018The El\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMen I have traveled with through time, the women, even the girl-women, have been continents I inhabited. To break up, to split with a woman, is to be sent into exile.\u201d – LJ Pemberton, \u2018Still Alive\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201c\u2026other cities where he\u2019d been in exile\u2014Seville, Gibraltar, New York\u2014all of them rich, but none like this, where you could so clearly see the blood on the gold.\u201d – Yuri Herrera, \u2018Season Of The Swamp\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNative Hawaiian traditional knowledge of realms above and below led to their success in navigating the largest body of water in the world\u2026the people know the Mauna is a sacred living being. That knowledge is not held by those who seek to colonize land and space.\u201d – Winona LaDuke, \u2018To Be A Water Protector\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cJimmy asked me the usual question did you get any pussy \/ no I got forgiveness for my sins\u201d – Frank Stanford, \u2018The Battlefield Where The Moon Says I Love You\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThieves, injuries, fatalities. But who remembered any of that when you could breathe again.\u201d – Yuri Herrera, \u2018Season Of The Swamp\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI had never talked to the frogs; I despised anthropomorphizing animals\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018Annihilation\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNo one heard us and no one saw us, everyone in the neighborhood at work or lying on the couch watching TV, unable or incapable of giving a shit.\u201d – Theodore C. Van Alst Jr, \u2018The El\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThat\u2019s how the madness of the outside world tries to colonize you: from the outside in, forcing you to live in its reality.\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018ANNIHILATION\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt is difficult to tell what blanks my mind might be filling in just to remove the weight of so many unknowns.\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018ANNIHILATION\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHands. Hands with no person\u2026They could convince themselves that what they were doing wasn\u2019t being done to a person if they called them hands.\u201d – Yuri Herrera, \u2018Season Of The Swamp\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cImagine\u2026that language is only part of a method of communication. Imagine it isn\u2019t even the most important part but more like the pipeline, the highway. A conduit only.\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018Authority\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThere\u2019s a regret in you\u2026the expeditions are never told that people had lived here, worked here, got drunk here, and played music here. People who lived in mobile homes and bungalows and lighthouses. Better not to think of people living here, of it being empty\u2026and yet now you want someone to remember, to understand what was lost\u2026\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018Acceptance\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThere was in the smell of his sweat and the brine of the water, the sudden tangy smell, almost a flavor, a sense of honest effort. The tautness of her triceps, her forearms as she put her back into it. The pleasing soreness that came after, letting her know this was effort, this was real.\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018Acceptance\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNumbness? A sense of having gone through so many crises that emotion must be hoarded, that it might not run out.\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u201cAcceptance\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201dWhy be afraid of what you could not prevent?\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018Acceptance\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat history do I belong to? I don\u2019t know where my skin comes from. \/ But I know the color it bruises.\u201d – Teo Shannon, \u201cLast Phone Call with Grandpa Ruben\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe best thing on this earth is a woman \/ God sends us men when we want other satisfaction.\u201d – Chase Berggrun, \u2018RED\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn Colombia, any gathering of more than six people, regardless of class or the hour, is doomed to turn into a dance\u201d – Gabriel Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez, \u2018News Of A Kidnapping\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHe was at a loss for words and remembered violence\u201d – Chase Berggrun, \u2018RED\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201c\u2026it was inconceivable that one of the largest transnational enterprises in the world did not have enough compassion to provide humane conditions for its kidnappers and their victims.\u201d – Gabriel Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez, \u2018News Of A Kidnapping\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHe\u2019d wasted his entire life. Such people were very dear to those of us who\u2019d wasted only a few years.\u201d – Denis Johnson, \u201cOut On Bail\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWho should be pouring drinks there but some young woman whose name I don\u2019t remember.\u201d – Denis Johnson, \u201cWork\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe world! These days it\u2019s all been erased and they\u2019ve rolled it up like a scroll and put it away somewhere. Yes, I can touch it with my fingers. But where is it?\u201d – Denis Johnson, \u201cWork\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI had two doubles and immediately it was as if I\u2019d been dead forever, and was now finally awake.\u201d – Denis Johnson, \u201cHappy Hour\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhile they were eating they followed the unbreakable Antioquian custom of discussing nothing but the food.\u201d – Gabriel Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez, \u2018News Of A Kidnapping\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThen only the demons inhabiting us could be seen. Souls who had wronged each other were brought together here.\u201d – Denis Johnson, \u201cHappy Hour\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAnd what are you going to do to me now? With what, exactly, would you expect to frighten me?\u201d – Denis Johnson, \u201cHappy Hour\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTalk into my bullet hole. Tell me I\u2019m fine.\u201d – Denis Johnson, \u201cSteady Hands At Seattle General\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI ask were you shocked \/ My coroner was a woman \/ Or that her skirt \/ Was so tiny \/ What does this say about society \/ Is it flawed \/ It is flawed\u201d – Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi, \u201ci like to get naked\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSend me up like wedding rice my maidens I will be soothed\u201d – Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi, \u201csend me up my maidens\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou know what movie I like \/ Bambi \/ Especially the scene \/ Where the Hunter ate bambi\u2019s mother \/ I mean they did not show the feast \/ I thought it was implied \/ She was delish \/ And ok this does not \/ Have to turn into a review \/ But why did we not see \/ More of the hunter\u2019s journey \/ I am not into deer and bunny crap\u201d – Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi, \u201cmy weakness is for violence and violation\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cMen have two fears \/ The first is crashing your hang glider \/ Into the center of the ocean at 1 am \/ And having to swim around naked for hours \/ Until a shark hears you splashing \/ The other fear is living forever\u201d – Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi, \u201csleep story\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe key to transcendence was never to receive \/ It was always to give \/ Pursuing the thing that transforms us \/ Holy fuck a moly all this wisdom \/ I don\u2019t want you ever to fear\u201d – Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi, \u201cyears of drinking blood and nipping at the cud of flowers\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou made the horrific commitment to strangle \/ I imagine it was for the feeling??\u201d – Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi, \u201ci don\u2019t think normal things\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey say the flavor of victory \/ Is red and succulent \/ Somewhat like a costco hot dog.\u201d – Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi, \u201cupon his bed of oak\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cHe put it like this: \u2018I want to be a Bond villain.\u2019 Simple.\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018Dr. No\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTo experience the power of nothing would be to understand everything; to harness the power of nothing would be to negate this, and the sad, scary, crucial idea here is that this might well be a distinction without a difference.\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018Dr. No\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt was a mathematician\u2019s response. Of course she was correct, but the answer was useless.\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018Dr. No\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEigen was dressed in a red bikini, looking like a mathematician in a bikini.\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018Dr. No\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat kind of muscle are you two? You let a mathematician kick your asses?\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018Dr. No\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI felt hollow. I felt grief. I was too slow. I couldn\u2019t recognize nothing until it was too late.\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018Dr. No\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI work very hard and I wish I could say I have nothing to show for it.\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018Dr. No\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cEasy money, a narcotic more harmful than the ill-named \u2018heroic drugs,\u2019 had been injected into the culture.\u201d – Gabriel Garc\u00eda M\u00e1rquez, \u2018News Of A Kidnapping\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSeditious thought: there would be nothing too terrible about dying out here, about becoming part of all of this.\u201d – Jeff VanderMeer, \u2018Authority\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe all laughed as we heard the white boys hightail it out of there.\u201d – Percival Everett, \u2018James\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cBro, you ain\u2019t the only one who picks up the newspaper, knows where the library is, likes the big humbug in Beowulf, moving out on Grendel and whatnot, or fighting orcs and shit.\u201d – Theodore C. Van Alst, Jr., \u2018The El\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s it! I hope this was a fun reading experience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Sorry you got an email, <\/p>\n\n\n\n Chris<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" “The trick is to teach yourself to read in small sips as well as long swallows.” – Stephen King, ‘On Writing’ Apologies to my parents for the frank weed discussion […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":162657840,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[169,10],"tags":[29,84],"class_list":["post-162657788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-shipwrecked-sailor-blog","category-wednesday-column","tag-reading","tag-writing-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=162657788"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":162657842,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162657788\/revisions\/162657842"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/162657840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=162657788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=162657788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=162657788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"an](\"https:\/\/www.lazyandentitled.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/image-8-1024x985.png\")
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